Urban Rivers and Watersheds
On September 2005, the LA Times wrote "is the LA River the city's most prominent gutter or a river waiting to be reborn ?" On that day Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa announced a massive public works project to clean up the river, build parks along it and restore some sections to a more natural state. Los Angeles River Rebornthumb|300px|left Background The Los Angeles River starts in the San Fernando Valley, in the Simi Hills and Santa Susanna Mountains and flows through Los Angeles County from Conaga Park for 51 miles to its mouth i n Long Beach. Its flows through 14 cities, countless neighborhoods and is the heart of a 871 square mile watershed. It has a diverse patterns of land use from forest or open spaces to highly urbanized users, commercial, industrial and residential users. LA River is 45 times shorter than the Mississippi, but drops 795 feet from its headwaters in the San Fernando valley to its end in Long Beach. Its is 150 feet more than the Mississippi drops in its entire 2350 miles, so LA River is short but steep. History c 800 BC '- Gabrielino-Taongra tribe settled along LA River. '''1769 '- Portola Expedition found a good size full flowing river lined with lush greenery. '''1781 - Spanish colonist found El Pueblo de la Reina de los Angeles and build Zanja Madre to deliver water to the pueblo. 1781-1931 '- LA River, sole source of water for Los Angeles. '''1931 '- LA Aqueduct is completed to import water from Owens River. '1934-1938 '- Floods took 85 lives and caused $23M in property damanged, recalled of then mayor Frank Shaw. '1938-1959 '- US Army Corps of Engineers built concrete channel for the River and major tributaries and storm water drains channel rainfall into the River. '''2007 - City of LA adopts L.A River Revitalization Master Plan,http://www.lariverrmp.org/ which designs a 32 mile greenway from Conoga park through downtown LA to Vernon. 2010 - EPA declares LA River "traditional navigable waters" a designation crucial to applying Clean Water Act protections.http://www.epa.gov/oecaagct/lcwa.html LA River LA River is know to many as a flood control channel, a backdrop to movies and music videos.The Army Corps of Engineers paved 80% of the river creating the world's largest storm drain with its graffiti- marred banks strewn with rotting garbage and polluted with chemicals illegally dumped in storm drains and gutters that empties into it. Mainstreet-1-.jpg Images-1-.jpg Headwaters-1-.jpg 57397237-1-.jpg 6th-st-bridge-1-.jpg IMG 2482-1-.jpg Revitalization Projects LA River revitalization projects are the results of the combined efforts of City of LA, many State & Federal Agencies , Environmental Groups such as Friends of the Los Angeles River http://folar.org/ and The River Project http://www.theriverproject.org/about.html and the communities living along the river. The Los Angeles River Revitalization Plan is a 20 year blue print for the development and mangement of the river identifying proposals that would make the river the 'front door' to the city, supporting a full range of public activities. This plan is adoptedby the City of LA in May 2007. The enviromental groups advocates the restoration of the river and its natural habitat, developing recreational users along and in the river and education and cleanup programs for students and the community. *Bikeways, The LA river Bikeway will eventually run 52 miles from Canoga park to Long Beach. See labikepaths.com http://www.labikepaths.com/ for a guide. Importance of Rivers in Communities Summary http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Angeles_River http://www.lariverrmp.org/ http://folar.org/ http://councilcommittee.lacity.org/lariver/ Category:urban rivers